


Wicked Game (With Apologies to Monseiur Domínguez)

by pinkbubblesgo



Series: Jukebox Stories [8]
Category: Original Work
Genre: 2010s, Bilingual Character(s), Biphobia, Bisexual Female Character, Bisexuality, Coming Out, Coming of Age, F/F, France (Country), Harry Potter References, Humor, Latino Character, Love Metal, Music, POV First Person, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-20
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:13:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24280360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pinkbubblesgo/pseuds/pinkbubblesgo
Summary: This one has aplaylisttoo.
Series: Jukebox Stories [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/547435





	Wicked Game (With Apologies to Monseiur Domínguez)

It was the summer of 2010, when everybody called me Parsel and it didn’t occur to me to mind. That was before the It Gets Better campaign, before Trump, when I couldn't wait to get the perfect MTV makeover and Katy Perry was promising us the teenage dream. That was the summer I went to Paris. 

My parents agreed to sent me off because they wanted to get rid of me for the summer, and who could blame them? I had mediocre to bad grades and only one friend. I was fucking up their beloved American Dream. I had lied my ass off in my entry essay to get the scholarship, to make my parents proud yadiyada, and a year later there I was, only brown kid in the class of 2009. Say cheese! Bunch of wankers. I mean it. I've never seen such concentration of smug assholes in one classroom before; worse than high school, even. They had the best hair and the best phones and they wouldn't let you forget it for one minute. One of them was the typical jerk who called you fat because your body wasn’t that of an anime girl. So what was I doing there? My parents chose Marketing because of the money, I had no say in it. Something like English or Hispanic literature, which I loved, wouldn't have done it for them.

But there was a little oasis of happiness in all that mess: my college dorm with its walls full of posters of pretty Finnish boys who played love metal (not actual metal, it was more of a combination of watered down gothic rock and Tokio Hotel). I had four albums constantly playing in my stereo: HIM's _Razorblade Romance_ , The 69 Eyes’ _Back in Blood_ and of course, my favorite record at the time, _Sweet Bloody Tears_ by Lovesick. My roommate Cynthia happened to love all those bands too, and that's basically how we became friends. It didn't hurt that she didn't give a shit about marketing either. 

So anyway, as I was saying, my parents thought working abroad was what I needed to get a little perspective and go back to the "right" path. And it was good for me too, that with the rumor about me that went around campus those days, God, I couldn't have stayed one more day in there.

What my parents didn’t know was that I had a deeper reason for choosing France (the only thing they let me chose back then). I chose it because maybe I could start my writing career there, like the big authors before me, García Márquez, Vargas Llosa, Cortázar, the whole “Latin American Boom” of the 60s and 70s. I hadn't written crap since high school, but I was sure that just by being at The Quartier Latin, the Senna, the cafés, you know, those places, I would pick up the quill again. So, at the beginning of 2010, I quietly started studying French on my own until I contacted this Filipino-French family to be their au-pair for the summer. And just my luck, the father spoke Spanish and wanted his children to keep practicing. 

The Desrosiers-Domínguez (I'm gonna write it out like this even if it pisses off the French) were nice folks. I signed a contract with them to take care of their three kids, Didier, Antoine and Chloe, for two months with free weekends. They had a huge house in 16th Arrondissement (yes, quite rich) and gave me a minuscule apartment, basically an _appendix_ of their house, for me to hang out at when I wasn’t looking out for the kids. I called it my cupboard ‘cause it looked like where Harry Potter used to live in when he was little. The kitchen, bed and toilet were all within five square meters; but I got used to it quick, it wasn’t much smaller than my place in El Paso.

I still remember the day I saw the ad. It was a Friday and I was walking the Desrosiers-Domínguez’ dog when the faces of Lovesick appeared huge before me, on a bus advertising, with the date and place of their Paris show. So as you can imagine, the leash slipped off my hand and I had to chase the goodest boy for a few meters. But I didn't miss the date of the show: it was the upcoming Saturday. 

It was my big chance. With Katy Perry’s "Firework" playing in my head, I happily arrived home and asked Monsieur if I could go to the show. The nerve of that, hah! If you had met them, though, you'd knew that concert expenses were like _dimes_ to them. Besides, I had been such a good au-pair; I didn't drink (proud straight-edge until then) nor brought boys to the hamster house. I told all that to Monsieur, adding that the show was on my day off anyway.

“Don’t worry, Sandra” he said to me in Spanish. “Madame and I are going to the beach this weekend anyway. We’re taking Olivier and the children". 

Olivier was the dog. It killed me that he had such a person's name. 

“Oh,” I said.

“I was actually about to ask you if you wanted to come,” he said gently. “But I understand girls your age love rock shows.” 

Rock. That's funny in hindsight. 

“So no one will be home this weekend?” I asked. 

“No one,” Monsieur Domínguez said. “But you have the key to the apartment, and there’s plenty of food. Alright?”

He was smiling at me, which was usual for him. 

“Thanks, señ—I mean, Monsieur.”

“I'll tell my brother-in-law to drive you and pick you up. Where is the show?”

“At the Bataclan.”

Come Saturday night and there I was, about a million rows away from the stage. All my college problems seemed so insignificant in that moment, and with the stories of Lovesick disbanding soon, it was even more special. Maybe that would be one of their last shows, and I wasn't missing it. But most of all, I didn’t feel like such a weirdo there, with the multicolored lights, the Rasmus’ music resonating on the yet empty stage, and other girls wearing the same stripped socks and butterfly-shaped hair clutchers as me.

In about an hour the theater was filled of girls squeeing hysterically to each other and mean bouncers trying to keep the front rowers off the stage. Even in the back everyone was excited.

Finally the band came out. Stevie Love (birth name Severi Hiltunen) was the front man, with his long platinum blonde hair sparkling in the dark, super tight pants and make up all over his face. He waved at us, grinned his perfect white teeth and said “Bounjour, Paris!” into the microphone, with a terrible accent. That's when I'm pretty sure I went deaf from all the screaming. A girl next to me was _bawling_. Me? I repress my emotions until I get a tumor. 

The other band members were standing ready at their positions, but let’s be honest, nobody cared much about them. They also had fabulous clothes and hair and make-up, but they just weren’t as hot as Stevie. The drummer banged on a snare three times, and the show began with Mikko on the opening riffs.

Stevie could hardly even be heard with that teeny tiny Mickey Mouse voice of his, but we didn’t care. The best part of Lovesick’s shows was when he turned around and his peachy butt bounced for all of us. He also liked to hump the microphone stick once or twice. 

The show was going great, four songs in, when something pointy hit my ribs. It nearly knocked the wind out of me, since I have the strength of an eight year old.

"Watch it!" I protested towards the girl on my right, 'cause I knew it had been her elbow.

Of course, I had forgotten the country I was in, and I subsequently got ignored. She kept on jumping and singing as if nothing had happened.

"Sorry about that!" Another voice shouted, definitely British. Ladies and gentleman, a Parisian miracle. 

I turned sideways: it was another girl about three girls away from the elbowing girl. She had dark red hair, which looked psychedelic in those lights, and was shorter than my 5'6 self. 

Squishing through the other girls, she walked towards me and apologized again, said her cousin had never been to a concert before and didn't speak any English. I just smiled and told her it was alright. I was happy to have finally found another English speaking person.

"I'm Sophie" she said, lowly this time because the band was playing a ballad. And of course her name was actually pronounced Sophìe. "And you are…?"

"Sandra,” I said.

" _Latino-Americaine?_ ”

" _Oui_ ”.

She nodded with a cunning smile and turned her attention back to the band, who was finishing the song. With her hands now in the air, I could see both her arms were covered in roses tattoos.

After the show was over and we were drinking sodas (alcohol was not allowed there), she introduced me to one of her friends, a Czech named Blazena who everyone called Blaze and went to Nanterre. The cousin was nowhere to be found, Sophie said she had to go home early because she was a minor. 

"Who's that Stevie's chatting up?" Blaze suddenly said, and we all turned our gaze to the area just below the stage, where the meet-and-greeting usually occurred.

Stevie was standing very close to a girl who looked no older than sixteen. He whispered in her ear and she giggled.

"Isn't that illegal here?” I said.

"Doesn't matter, it's all fake," Sophie said after a chuckle. "Stevie's gay. Hopelessly gay."

I eyed her as if she belonged to an asylum. "He's not gay! People like spreading rumors-"

"Fine, believe whatever you want. But I've seen stuff."

After that bombing piece of information Blaze and I looked at each other, puzzled. Then Sophie searched her purse and took out a beer can.

"What are you doing?" Blaze’s voice was shaky.

“What?” Sophie protested as she opened the can. “You don’t expect me to drink coke, do you? I’m nineteen.”

She said nothing for a while, drinking her beer. Then she asked us if we were free for the weekend.

“No, sorry,” Blaze said. “Got to study.”

"I'm free,” I said.

"Alright!" Sophie grinned. But right away I said:

"But I'm not sure if I can leave my workplace. I'm an au-pair and--" 

"Oh, don't worry about that, what they don't know can't hurt them. My dad is on a trip and the house is a bit lonely. We could hang."

I don't know what possessed me, but I didn't overthink much.

“Sure, let’s do it.”

She grinned. “How old are you, by the way?”

“Twenty-one,” I replied.

“Nice!" 

When we got out of the Bataclan, we ran into the problem of my driver. I had completely forgotten that he was supposed to drive me back to my cupboard. But you should have seen Sophie's face when she saw the limousine and the clothes he was wearing.

“Do you work for Sarkozy?” she asked me before laughing. 

I smiled a little. The guy was looking at us for answers. “What do we do now?” I muttered. "I don't know how to explain--”

“Let me handle it.”

To my shock, she started flirting with my driver. And this was a guy of around 50 years old that looked big enough to kidnap us both. Like in Taken. _I've got a particular set of skills_. I started pondering which of us would get rescued first when Sophie came back to me, looking happy. She translated that my driver was okay with me hanging out at her place for the weekend, and that he was even picking me up from there. I desperately told him not to say anything to Monsieur, and thank God he was very cool about it. _Vive la liberté_.

Imagine driving from the 11th Arrondissement to the 16th, it was endless! I laid in the backseat of the back of the limo, I was so tired, and Sophie was on the front seat. Thankfully, she lived right next to “my” neighborhood, on the 8th, so I packed my stuff in this trunk (I hoard a lot of things) and hoped on the limo again.

When we got to her house, it was still dark and my watched marked 3:30. My jaw nearly dropped, my dear droogs. It was really a mansion more than a house; two stories, cream-colored, nice smell even! And to top it off, an aristocratic white cat was watching us from the living room window. 

“Oi, Pocahontas!”

Sophie had already gotten out of the car.

“Sorry,” I said and rubbed my eyes. “It’s just, your house is nice,” I slowly got up from the back seat and opened the car door.

“Come on.”

After I got my trunk from the back of the car, we crossed the little garden at the entrance. While Sophie got her keys out, the cat hissed at me, making me jump like a scared Chihuahua.

Sophie laughed and asked me if I like cats. 

“No, they always scratch me,” I replied. 

We finally got inside the house. 

“ _S'accrocher_ , Stevie!” Sophie scolded him.

“Your cat’s name is Stevie?”

“Yeah,” she replied. “It’s cute, like him.”

It was pristine inside, as if no one (or a really good housekeeper) had lived there for weeks. Everything was spacious and there were no dirty dishes, dust or laundry to be seen anywhere. Stevie (the cat) was gently rubbing himself on my leg. 

“He's getting to know you!” Sophie told me. She bent over to scratch his back and looked up at me. “So… what are you up to?”

“ _Sleep_ ,” I said, “what else?”

She laughed, a deep laugh that scared me a little bit. “The best things happen at night.”

“O-kay…” I uttered, then grabbed my trunk again. "I'll take the couch." 

I did it out of habit, I swear. Of course I knew what kind of house I was in. 

Sophie was laughing again. 

“You can take the guest room," she said, pointing up. 

“Oh. Really, I won’t be making you uncomfortable?”

“No, not at all.”

I lingered for a moment. I didn’t like making people uncomfortable.

“Yeah, alright,” I said.

So she helped me carry my trunk upstairs and said goodnight when we were in front of the guest room. I stepped in.

There were about a thousand band posters above Sophie’s bed. Lovesick, Ville Valo, Evanescence, The Rasmus, and even a Marilyn Manson one. I took one last look at all of them before yawning and decided I’d finally sleep. I bent over to open my trunk and take out my pajamas, and after a thorough searching I realized I hadn’t packed them. I was an idiot.

I only slept for about two hours, because I forgot to turn off my phone’s alarm and it went off at 6 AM. I panicked, thinking Monsieur was suddenly back home for some reason and hadn’t found me in my cupboard aka hamster apartment. Then I pictured him calling me and texting me like crazy and finally calling the police to tell them I had left my workplace. I'd be deported. _Get out of the countgree, you forheign filth._

_Shit_ , I said to myself as I jerked up. _I really need to stop worrying. It’s summer. This is París._

I drew the curtains open, letting the sunlight wake me up for good. Then I stretched out, got my towel, robe and sandals out of my trunk and headed for the bathroom next to me. It was shut close, though. Grimacing, I went downstairs. The bathroom next to Sophie’s room was also closed, but you could see steam coming through it. As soon as I thought of knocking, though, she came out. The big towel wrapping her red hair made her look a lot taller and her tiny red robe a lot smaller. She was dripping. 

“Sorry about the other bathroom”, she said, stepping aside. “My dad says he’s fixing it every summer but here we are.”

“Right, okay,” I muttered.

“Eyes up here, Pocahontas,” she laughed at my staring. “I’m going to make breakfast.”

“Okay,” I said. 

And Sophie left for the kitchen. 

When I had finished changing into new clothes the awkwardness had passed. I smiled lightly, took a deep breath and thought, “it’s gonna be alright. Let’s have fun”. Outside, the dinner table had only coffee cups and Granola cookies on it. I was starving, I never thought a rich person's house would have no food. 

“Only cookies?” I asked, grimacing. 

“It has fiber. It will keep you full. Besides, I get all my energy from caffeine, anyway.”

“Oh.”

As I went over to the fridge and opened it, I recalled this anorexic/bulimic girl from my school in El Paso. She was fat in seventh grade, when she arrived, and the next term she was easily 105 pounds. Only by avoiding big meals and throwing up when her parents weren't around, she told me. She became quite popular. 

I grabbed the jam and butter and closed the fridge. You could say I’m a big eater. I don’t eat as much as guys, but it’s still a lot.

“How do you do it?” Sophie asked me, perplexed. 

“Hmm?” I had my mouth full of toast and jam. I swallowed. “How do I do what?”

“Be skinny like you are. If I ate what you ate…” she inflated her cheeks and stretched her arms. I laughed.

“Well, I don’t know,” I smiled apologetically. “I've always been thin. Thanks anyway.”

So I had breakfast, somewhat uncomfortable because Sophie only had a tiny cup of coffee. Literally a cup of coffee.

“How come you have a British accent?” I asked her. I do that a lot, say something awkward when I’m feeling awkward.

“My mum was British.”

“Ah. Uh, sorry.”

Nothing could top the awkwardness at that moment. Right?

“Are you in America illegally?” she asked me. Yes, it could. 

“No, I was lucky,” I replied with a smile. “My family moved to the US when I was eleven. It was easier to get the residence back then.”

“Oh. You moved from where?”

“South America.”

“Yeah, but where?”

“Just a country…”I looked at my half empty plate. “In South America.” 

Sophie grinned. “You can tell me… I’m not a racist. I have tolerance glasses up to a hundred”.

That made me laugh for real, but I still didn't tell her about my country. I never tell anyone. You’d have to torture me. Thank God she didn’t insist.

“What do you like doing, Sandra?” Sophie asked me, elbow on the table and all. It felt nice to be listened to.

“I don’t know, listening to music, reading…”

“Really? What’s your favorite book?”

“Huh… The Little Prince."

“Oh, from _that_ bloke!"

"Yes".

" _Merci_ ".

She looked like a cute emo girl with that smile, so I smiled too.

“You seem like such a bookworm", she declared, and she wasn't wrong. “We _must_ have a good time this weekend. I’ll teach you.”

It all seemed great, really, but I suddenly remembered it was soccer time and I hit my head with the lamp when I stood up. Soccer was still my idea of a good time.

“I think Germany plays today,” I said and turned my head to see the television on the living room.

Sophie gave me a look. “Don’t tell me you like football.”

“What’s wrong with football?”

“It's fucking boring,” she rolled her eyes.

That was the last thing I expected to hear in Europe, but I ignored it and turned the TV on. The Germany - Croatia match was in its 23rd minute. Draw. 

“Wouldn't you like to swim for a while?” Sophie asked me from behind. 

“Where?” I said, focused on the TV.

“In my pool, silly.” 

My eyes widened in surprise and I turned my head. “You have a pool?”

It was right behind the kitchen, I had just noticed. It looked so blue and fresh… But I didn't want to miss the game. 

“I've just eaten,” I excused myself. 

“That's rubbish,” Sophie said. “C’mon.”

I smirked silly. “After the first half.” 

“Alright,” she agreed. “I'm going in first.” 

So there I was, in the couch, waiting for Kroos’ free kick, when I heard Sophie open the backdoor. Without the darkness of the night, I could see her more clearly: her violent red hair matched with her bikini of the same color, and her pale legs. European girl to a T. She was easily a head shorter than me, but had a lot more stage presence, if I may call it that. 

_Oh crap_ , I thought as she got into the pool. Something remarkable was happening in me, something stronger than other times, but I ignored it just as I used to ignore anything that was unknown, different, scary.

At the 40th minute of the first half, Sophie called for me. I shot one last dreamy look at Thomas Müller and turned the TV off. 

I didn't have a bikini, only a full swimsuit I'd been wearing since I was 15. Madame Desrosiers offered to buy me a bikini all summer but I said no everytime; I didn't want to show too much of my body. It made me feel very self-conscious. Anyway, the swimsuit was light blue, which Sophie said went well with my skin tone. 

“Thanks”, I said. "It's a bit tight, though." 

“And your bum is so cute!” she added. I looked back at it and smiled, against my usual shyness. “It is?”

“Get in!” she exclaimed from the water. Her red hair looked even prettier when wet. 

I sat down and slid inside the pool. It was cold as hell, but the intense weather demanded it, so I plunged my body down and up. Sue was floating on her back. 

“What's that on your chest?” I asked her. It looked like a bad tattoo. 

“Lovesick,” she answered dreamily. 

“Ooh let me see!”

I got closer to check it out, but the bikini’s brooch was covering it.

“Could you…?" I asked, trying to open the brooch. Sue helped me, saying how easy it was, until her breasts were out in the open. 

I started brushing the tattoo with my finger, nearly feeling the ink. "It looks nice," I lied. It really was a horrible horrible tattoo, something I could get at my home country for three bucks. But that was the least important thing at that moment.

The something remarkable was happening again, more intensely. I moved my finger beyond the tattoo area and felt Sophie's cold skin, her visible goosebumps, the softness. I loved it.

“Oh, sorry,” I came to. My ears were red with panic. 

“You really like it?” Sophie asked me with a delicious smile. I could feel her breath on my face.

"The tattoo?" 

_No, her breasts, you idiot!_

"Yeah." 

“Yeah, it's a good one,” I lied again, seeing it properly. It was a drawing of Lovesick’s logo (a heart with spikes) and their name. “Though it’s a very… very weird place to get a tattoo onto.”

She giggled. “Weird? It’s close to my heart!” Then I giggled too. “And the band is close to my heart, so it makes sense.”

I just smiled at her.

“You’re one to talk! You’ve got a Poison tattoo!”

I was hoping she hadn’t noticed, me standing on the right angle and crap. But it’s true, I have a Poison tattoo on my left wrist.

“I thought you hadn’t noticed,” I said. “My _familia_ is always speaking ill of it.”

She sort of snorted, laughing. “Right, _latin_ families… you sneaked out to get it?”

“No, I got it when I was eighteen. So legally my parents can’t do anything about it, you know.”

“Right.”

I never know when a conversation has ended, so I awkwardly took a step back and started floating and swimming on my back. It gave me a sense of freedom I had never experienced before: being in Paris, away from everyone I hated, in the summertime, free at last even if it was just for two days. Sophie soon joined me, and for a while we just floated in the water like two lost ships. 

“You have sunglasses?” I asked, because the sun was hurting my eyes. 

As she didn't reply, I looked at her and saw her undressing. 

“No,” she answered. "Sunscreen is what I need." 

So I stood there, shaking just a little as she grabbed a bottle and applied the cream. Eventually she noticed I was staring and smiled. 

“Like what you see?” she said in the most English/French way that just drove me crazy. I didn’t say anything back, though, so she _laughed_ , of course.

"Sorry," I said and looked away. 

And that's when it happened. She pulled me closer by the waist and pressed her lips against mine.

Now, I’d like to say that our first kiss, _my_ first kiss with another girl, was the best one ever, or that it blew my mind out, or that I saw stars, or whatever words romance writers use to describe a kiss; but it wasn’t. Turns out I sucked at kissing girls. 

“Nooo, not like that!” Sophie complained. “I’m not a _bloke_ , alright?”

She wasn’t mad, though, because right away she pulled me even closer, rested her hands on my lower back and kissed me again. _That_ _one_ I saw stars with.

Eventually we had to get out of the pool to keep on snogging, and boy was that excruciatingly pleasant. The problem was that I wasn’t sure about the next step. Wouldn’t it be something that changed me forever? And if she had taught me how to kiss girls, then she could also teach me how to… 

“Let’s smoke a joint,” Sophie suggested.

“Uh…” I mumbled, looking down. 

“No one's ever caught me.” 

“What if I die?”

She exploded with laughter. “No one _dies_ from weed! Unless you take crazy meds, maybe. You take crazy meds?”

“No…” 

“Let's smoke, then.” 

She went inside the house and brought a backpack, which she zipped open in front of me. It had a lot of joints inside. 

“We're gonna get in trouble,” I said, still scared. 

“Stop worrying! The police never comes here.”

She lightened a joint for herself and the other for me. I didn't know what to do with it. 

“Just smoke it like a fag,” Sophie told me. 

“I don't smoke cigarettes,” I told her. 

“Do you drink?” 

“No.” 

“Are you a nun?” she mocked me. “Please don't tell me you're still a virgin.” 

“That, no, that ship has sailed,” I chuckled-shuddered. 

“Good. When did you lose it?”

“Eighth grade.” 

“Me too!”

I smiled in relief. Not feeling like such a _puta_ anymore was the greatest warm up for marihuana. 

So she taught me how to smoke and puff, and although it felt like I was choking and falling asleep at first, I got used to it. And it relaxed me so much I stopped overthinking about my sudden new sexuality. Was it really that new, though? 

“How are you feeling?” Sophie asked me. 

“Amazing” I said, grinning. “A little sleepy, though. And you have a lovely garden!”

“It _does_ look great when you're high, doesn't it?”

I didn't reply, busy as I was with the lovely colors. 

Then I started with the weird shit. I visualized a Prisoner of Azkaban scene in my mind and broke into tap-dancing, like in the 1940s.

"They want me to tap-dance!" I said. "I don't wanna tap-dance, Harry!"

Sophie cracked up. I don't remember what happened between the time I stopped with the dance and when she offered me more weed. Boy, when they say your first trip is the best...

Anyway. I was happily smoking it when her voice reverberated from afar.

“Let's go to the roof!” it said.

Somehow I shook my head enough to realize I couldn't just sit in a hot roof, in my swimsuit, smoking pot. 

“We'll get caught!” I shouted.

“There are no cops here, remember?”

So we sat over some towels in the roof, both of us wearing sunglasses. The pot had passed its peak within me and I didn't feel like a dancing loon anymore. It was steady, relaxing, nice. 

“Why don't you have a Lovesick tattoo?” Sophie asked me. 

I felt judged, like I wasn't enough of a fan. 

“I don't know,” I scratched my hair. “I haven't thought of a design.” 

“Yet.” 

“Yet,” I smiled. “And Poison was my first love anyways.” 

“Ugh, I hate glam bands,” Sophie complained, and I arched my eyebrows and laughed. 

“What? You know Lovesick takes influence from glam, right?”

“I wish it didn't.” 

I dropped it. I didn't want a music argument at that point, so I laid back on the towel and let the sun burn me to a crisp. Sophie did the same. 

“So what do you do?” I asked her. 

“I'm on my Sabbatical.” 

“What?”

“I don't know, I don't like anything enough to go to university for it. I'd just like to travel around the world, see things”. 

“Yeah, me too,” I sighed. 

“You look like you go to university.” 

“Yeah, marketing school,” I said with a grimace. “My parents made me. Sometimes it's fun, but I don't know if I have what it takes to be a marketer.” 

That didn't interested her, so she shifted closer to me and kissed me again. 

It was a full-on make out session, or snogging, as the Brits say. It reminded me of that afternoon after my First Communion (I was nine or ten) when my mom introduced me to her friend’s older daughter, who was fourteen at the time. I remember thinking how beautiful she was and how great I felt playing with her. We hang around for hours because the grown ups were eating in another part of the house, and I wished it never ended. But it did. We said goodbye and never saw each other again.

I can't explain why me and Sophie clicked so quickly, but it made sense at a time, in a weirdly logical way, for a French chick and a Latina chick only joined by a love metal band to hook up. And I couldn't let go of her. 

She apparently could, though, because she stopped to ask me if my father was a reverend. 

“No,” I frowned. “My parents are just regular Christians.”

“Regular? They sound barbaric to me. I wonder how they let you come here.”

“I send them money. Ten percent.” 

“Oh,” she chuckled. “Wow”.

It occurs to me now that I could have mocked her too for living off her dad, but something tells me that wasn't quite the same as living under Bible rules in America's Bible belt.

“Have you been to the Quartier Latin?” I asked her after a while of us both staring at the sun. 

“Only once. Why do you ask?”

I answered in a dreamy way I couldn't have achieved without drugs. 

“That's where all Latin authors took off.”

“You're a writer?”

“Sort of. I've written stories since Elementary school."

“Have you, really? Anything worth reading?”

“For high schoolers, yeah. I lost the password for those files though, so I had to delete them... I want to start over here. Is that too crazy?”

“Only as crazy as the rest of artists who come here.”

We were out of pot by then, so there was only maybe-a-lil-too-intimate glances to exchange. 

“Let's go to Quartier Latin!” I exclaimed. 

Sophie frowned. “No. Your driver's gone anyway.” 

“What?!”

I nearly fell off the roof, I swear to God. That would have been a sweet, ironic ending to my adventure. Very Woody-Allenish. 

“Well, I woke up before you did,” Sophie explained to me as I settled down, “and he really needed to eat, the poor thing, so I told him he could take off for the day and come back tomorrow.”

I was disappointed. 

“I didn't know you would get so touristy!” Sophie said, looking at me.” Your host family doesn't take you places?”

“Everywhere but the Quartier Latin,” I made a face.

“But you do know the Tower,” she inquired. 

“Of course.” 

I laid down in the wood again, thinking of how different would it be to do that route with someone who isn't your host family or without having to work at the same time. Before coming to Paris I had pictured myself walking by the Sienna, hand in hand with some tall, blonde French guy named Christophe or something. Now, the alternative, this alternate reality I had somehow been thrown into, was weirdly better.

Sophie’s cat started meowing from the first story. It was so adorable. I had never had cats, only one dog.

“He must be hungry,” Sophie said and went for him. 

I ended up coming down too because I wanted to play with Stevie after he had eaten. And he did let me rub his tummy and play a little before he fell asleep on my lap. What a sweet cat. 

It's funny that I remember the next bit in pieces, like stills from an old movie. It was like 6 in the afternoon and I was showering again because it was so hot and I had already ruined my swimsuit, when I heard the bathroom door open. Are the French so liberal they shower with the door opened?, I wondered as I turned around with a bit of shampoo in my hands. 

The next still is Sophie, still in her beach sandals, stepping inside the bathroom first and undrawing the curtains later. My head was exploding all galaxy brain like, and I couldn’t form a coherent thought or spoken word. She just smiled at me, wet and in her red bikini, and it was like staring directly at the sun, only you didn’t burn because the sun protected you, covered you in bliss.

The following still is of me and Sophie making out in the shower and I'm gonna stop right here because this story isn't erotica, dammit. If you clicked here hoping to find explicit lesbian sex you've come to the wrong place, buddy. Yes, I know there are straight guys reading. As for the rest of readers, if you guys still care about this narration beyond the sexy bits, do go on reading. It's only just beginning. 

I woke up the next day with such a feeling of elation not even the anxiety of having escaped my workplace to have same-sex intercourse could eclipse. It's the whole sex hormones talk again, what they can do to your brain to the point of laying in Sophie's bed with not a care in the world, blasting Lovesick from my phone. 

Then I saw the Jesus figure hanging on her wall and freaked out. _Jesus is watching you sin_. I was about 90 percent agnostic by then, but still had the ol’ Christian fear in my veins, so I took the figure down and opened Sophie's drawer to save it. 

What I saw next is part of my “What ultra liberal European thing will I encounter today” series. Which is actually ‘what French thing will I encounter today’, since there are in fact European countries more backwards than mine. Anyway. I found dildos of all sizes and colors inside Sophie's drawer. It made me feel frightened and horny at the same time. 

I must have stood there for a long time, thinking about it, because next thing I knew, there were cluttering noises coming from the kitchen. I still hadn't showered, but I smiled anyway and got out to greet Sophie. 

The thing was more embarrassing than when the kid from The Exorcist peed in the living room of her mom's party. A guy and a girl of Sophie's age were staring at my naked self from the dinning table. 

I ran back to her room and threw myself on the bed, trembling. I heard laughter, then my name, then something else in extremely fast French. Then I closed my eyes, trying to catch my breath and stop shaking. Okay, so two strangers had seen me naked and probably guessed I'd had sex with Sophie the night before. Sex. I’d had sex with another girl. 

It all downed on me. 

But at the same, I'd had it with sulking and being scared of everything. I needed a shower and I was going to get it, so I grabbed my slippers and one of Sophie's panties (I already had my towel in there) and ran towards the bathroom, shutting the door as hard as I could. 

Once I was dressed and clean, Sophie's friends were hanging out at the pool. The girl was called Emilie and the guy Cédric. 

“Cedric,” I beamed, thinking of Cedric Diggory. “Beautiful name.” 

“ _Quoi?_ ” he said. 

I shouldn't have said that. 

“ _Pourquoi ne parlez-vous pas français?_ ” he barked at me. 

"What's with you guys and the double negative?" 

“Pray that he didn't get that, Sandy," Sophie told me. 

“ _Désolé, Cedric_ ”, I apologized. " _Je suis désolé!_ "

For the uninitiated, that roughly translates as “I’m desolated”. _Desolated_ for making a mistake common in multilingual people. What a language, French. Jesus Christ.

I wanted to go back into the house, but Emilie gave me a joint I could not refuse. 

So we all smoked for a while, but as you can guess, I didn't participate in the conversation. I'm not much of a crowds person, as you can probably guess. And I was impatient 'cause me and Sophie only had a few hours left. I was very much aware that there had been only a day, but it didn't feel like that at all. It felt like a lifetime, and it wasn't due to the drugs. 

They did leave, eventually, and Sophie ordered a very high class lunch for us both. She apologized for not knowing how to cook, but I told her it was alright, that the important thing was to enjoy the delicious meal that our lord Jesus Christ was putting before us. My joke amused her, so I felt pretty good with myself. 

After lunch, we did it again (this time on her bed) and laid with our fingers locked as the sunset was seen through the windows. 

"I made out with a girl when I was eight," I started telling Sophie, just because I felt like it. "Well, she started it, to be honest, I just didn't resist…" I laughed, because I was still kind of high. "I don't know, it felt weird, maybe because she was fat… but it wasn't bad either… That's sort of how I--- Sophie?" 

She was trimming her nails. She hadn't listened to my story. Which was a true one, by the way, but it didn't involve boys or any audience of some sort. I'm not Katy Perry. 

When Sophie was done with her nails, she got up to the make up desk and searched for something on her laptop. She looked sexy from the back. 

"Why do you like me?" I asked her.

She snorted. "Why not?"

I smiled when the music came on. It was HIM's cover of Chris Isaak's "Wicked Game", which at the time I liked better than the original (sorry, Chris, kiss kiss make up). 

_The world was on fire and no one could save me but you_

_It's strange what desire will make foolish people do_

_I'd never dreamed that I'd meet somebody like you_

_And I'd never dreamed that I'd lose somebody like you_

The way Sophie looked back on me, her shadow in the dark, those are the kind of things one never forgets. 

About an hour later and while playing with her cat, Sophie had the wildest idea. 

“Let's be girlfriends on Facebook,” she told me. I was like,

“What?”

She smirked. “I'm going to update my relationship status. Aren't you?”

“Uh… I use Facebook for family only.”

She scoffed. "Come on!"

“No, really,” I said. “That's how my parents keep tabs on me.” 

She laughed then. “Create a new account. No one needs to know.” 

It didn't seem like a bad idea. And truthfully, I didn't have any close friends on Facebook except for Cindy and fellow Latino folks. So I did create a new account with the name Sandy Vallo (what an emo dork I was!) and added Sophie as my girlfriend. 

I can't explain what I felt next, once our ‘thing’ was out there on the internet. Sure, I didn't have people added but Sophie had, plenty of friends. It was official, but I didn't feel pressure or anxiety. I was too free to care, and it's not like I had all the time in France to follow the Necessary Steps for a relationship. 

Anyway. Me and Sophie spent the following hours getting high, watching the World Cup (we compromised) and having sex (in no particular order). At twilight, she changed into a flowery summer dress and started ironing her hair. She was radiant. 

"Don't you want to stay here?" she asked me as she put on eyeliner. 

"Here in your house?" I said. 

She chuckled. "Here in _France_." 

"Oh. Ooohh I'd love to, but my contract ends in two weeks." 

It has been pointed out to me that I'm slow at social cues. Yes, I'm mentioning this just now. 

"Are you serious?" I asked Sophie after she was done laughing. "You want us to…?" 

"Why not?" she smiled. "We'll live together and you won't have to answer to your crazy parents anymore. And you can write while I…" we giggled together. "While I live off my dad's money…!"

A couple of minutes later, we were speeding up streets and avenues I didn't know. I was about to feel sick, but I held it up for Sophie, who smirked at me from time to time. Lovesick was playing on her stereo. 

Sophie slowed down, and I could see the court building from my seat. This was it… 

I tried to open the car door, but it was stuck. I heard Sophie cackle and next thing I knew, the car had turned around all the way and we were speeding away from the court. She was now laughing with all her might, really enjoying it. I hid my face between my knees, unsure of what to say or do. We were going even faster than on the first ride. 

"Where are we going now?" I said, my voice muffled. 

Sophie didn't answer. But a good while passed before I asked another question. 

"Why did you do that?"

She shrugged. "I changed my mind." I thought we were going to crash, she was being so careless. "Let's go back home." 

Boy, did that business confused me. But we slept together and played around until we got tired, so I kind of didn't hold a grudge against her. And I wouldn't have traded the warmth of her skin against mine for anything in the world. 

That night I had a dream we got married in real life. There was a big ceremony, expensive like the P Diddy parties, and the guests were all naked. Sophie was pregnant with our child but still partied like there was no tomorrow. Then I saw the child, all grown up, and hugged her. I think she looked like me, I was going to find out but I woke up. 

My driver honked the stupor out of me. Of course it was already Monday morning and I had forgotten I was supposed to be in the hamster apartment. So I jumped off the bed (thank God Sophie wasn't there once again or I could have accidentally kick her), packed what I could pack and put on the same clothes I had arrived wearing. My driver was chuckling when I got out of the house. 

He didn't ask many questions, and I'll never know if it was because my French wasn't good or because he preferred to picture Sophie and me in his head, the big perv.

We got there just before eight, so I had enough time to change into pajamas and pretend the Desrosiers had caught me just waking up. And they did believe it when they came home. They were all beaming from their weekend at the beach and the kids talked non-stop. So it was fun, and it made me feel less guilty about sneaking out. 

I thought it would be extremely difficult to see or talk to Sophie again (I didn't even know her last name!) so I was sad that whole morning, but after lunch and while I was babysitting, I got a text on my phone. 

_I got your number before you left - Soph._

I smiled, feeling warmth in my gothic emo heart. 

_Awesome._ [I replied] _I thought you had forgotten about me lol_

_LOL I wouldn’t be able to._

Didier, the oldest kid, asked me who I was texting to, and I just said it was a friend from El Paso. 

_What r u doing_ [Sophie asked me] 

_Babysitting_ [I replied] 

_Zzzz. Let's have some fun._

_I can't leave the house._

At that, she sent me a picture of her breasts. I was in heaven, but felt guilty in front of the kids. I'm a bad bad person, I thought as I helped them with their toys and tried not to blush. There was really no other way for me to have fun with Sophie at the moment, though, so we dove into sexy talk for like hours. Then I tucked the kids in bed and went back to my cupboard.

The game went on for a week. She insisted on me sneaking out again, but the Desrosiers didn't have any plans of driving off to the beach once more, and they had made it very clear they wanted me to go with them on the next family trip. And I couldn’t give Sophie their address either, you think I’m insane in the membrane? So what we did was, I’d plug my earphones into my laptop and Sophie would talk to me normally while I typed or listened. It was very weird, but at least we could see each other.

It happened after another week, exactly 21 days after I first met Sophie. Damn my eidetic memory. It was a Thursday and I’d had a rough day babysitting (nothing normal kids don’t usually put you through) so I was eagerly waiting at my cupboard for Sophie to log in.

She did logged in, but her webcam was disabled.

> What’s wrong? [I asked her]

< Who are you? [she said]

> You’re serious? It’s me. 

Silence.

> Your girlfriend?

The word had a nice ring to it, I have to admit. Pity it lasted so little.

> Sandra [I insisted] 

< Oh, sweet Sandy, right! But I don’t have a girlfriend, thank God.

I was sweating so much. I wanted to die right there and then.

> Yes, you do.

> lol

> What’s wrong, Sophie? What did I do?

< I don’t know what you’re talking about, you’re weird today.

Never in the whole two months in Paris had my cupboard felt so tiny.

“You’re the one who’s being weird”, I wrote but deleted it.

> why do you have your webcam off?

< LOL

< I’m still me, still here, are you a detective?

My next thought was that she was probably too high. Last _hope_ , more like.

> got high today?

< no, clean as hell

< have you listened to the new single?

> new single from WHO? [Alright, I lost my nerve there with the caps] 

Facebook let me know she was typing, so I typed faster. 

> what the f is going on? why are you avoiding me?

She stopped typing and made me wait for an answer too. She knew how to hurt me, right from the first moment we met.

< LOVESICKS new single, of course. 

> I don’t wanna talk about Lovesick tonight.

Being as socially phobic as I was back then, what I typed next was the epitome of bravery. Trust me.

> I wanna talk about why are you pretending like it never happened. if you wanna dump me do it the old fashioned way at least

< Dump you? lol you’re the one that’s high.

< Since when are we together?

I logged out from Skype. It all had been too much. I started shaking because I had just been rejected, dumped (I don’t care what Sophie said), laughed at, ridiculed. Truthfully, the hamster apartment never felt more lonely, Paris never so cruel. I couldn't contact my campus friend Cindy, what would I say? _Hey Cindy, I’ve just been dumped at Harry’s cupboard and also I think I’m bisexual_. Jesus, what a mess.

I didn’t sleep for like six hours. The only thing that gave me a sort of peace was the thought that maybe it had all been a prank. That stuff sounded like Sophie’s sense of humor. Or maybe I would wake up the next morning and find it had been a bad dream.

But it hadn’t. The following days, she tried to keep talking with me as friends but I ignored her everytime. On the fifth day (God, this is like the Bible), she went on and on about Lovesick’s new song, I told her I didn’t give a damn about Lovesick and she blocked me everywhere. Everywhere, even on her phone. And that was all she wrote.

If you were expecting a proper, dramatic, _gothic_ dumping, go look elsewhere ‘cause this is what I got. We never get the endings we want, specially not us writers. And this had been a constant in my love life up to that point, being kicked out of my own stories just when I was enjoying them. 

But I digress. The next day was a Sunday and what did I do? Got drunk for the first time in my life from the old wine bottles Madame (Monsieur wouldn’t have, he was too quiet for that) had hidden in my cupboard. Screw my straight-edge allegiance (which had been ruined by pot anyway), all my life I had heard that one drowns their sorrows in alcohol and I wanted a taste of alcohol. I didn’t think I could end up in prison or deported, I just wanted to stop feeling things. I hoped to wake up after like, weeks, and be so out there that I wouldn’t remember Sophie at all.

Monsieur was the one who found me. I was about to choke on my own vomit, according to his version. Madame’s version was that I had disgraced the house of the Desrosiers-Domínguez and she would speak ill of me to other host families. She said "all of Paris" (aka her close high class friends) knew she had an au-pair and now she could not cope with the embarrassment. It took me a while to work up an excuse, as I sat in one of the sofas of the big house. 

“I really miss my family,” I told Madame.

“Your family? That’s why you did THIS?!”

Her high heels went pum pum pum on the floor and her clear eyes popped out with rage. 

“I’ve been feeling stressed,” I said in the same low tone. I wasn't bored, just numbed by the alcohol. “Us Hispanics are very close to our families.”

She swore me off and left the room, but came back a moment later.

“You didn’t do this for some boy?” she asked me. I shook my head and made my best holy Christian face. “Some girl?”

While I was shaking my head for a second time, Monsieur walked in.

“Girl? What are you saying, love? Sandra has never left here!”

God bless you, Monsieur, I thought while I looked at him.

Indeed, I was very lucky I didn’t get fired and deported, and it was all on Monsieur’s account. He made me get cleaned off the alcohol with a special diet and pills, and disinfect the hamster’s apartment by myself. Then he shut it closed and kept me as an au-pair for the remaining of my contract, making sure I video-chatted with my parents all that time. It worked for Madame too, because she could say to ~all of Paris~ that everything was going great with her au-pair. 

What followed were days and days of smiling and pretending, something I was tired of doing back in the US. I thought, perhaps naively, that it would all be different, thanks to Sophie. I thought, finally at 21 years of age, that my life could be my own and my sexual orientation no one else’s business. I dreamed of France and having pool parties and writing in a room of my own. That was, after all, how normal adults in the developed world lived. But I was still a long way from that. 

I got home (that is, El Paso) right after the World Cup final, and I remember because it was my only happy thought in the plane. My mom asked me about what I had learned in France and I shoot the crap for a while. Yeah, I came back multicultural, refined, educated, etcetera.

I sulked in my own misery for like two months. Sneaking out to drink, locking myself in my room with Adele's whambulance music through my earphones (I could not bear to hear a note of love metal anymore), staying up at night staring at the ceiling. When it was time for the new semester to begin, I decided I would go and come clean with the people that mattered. 

The rumor I mentioned at the beginning of this story was one about me being a lesbian. It was the talk of the town for two semesters. I never accepted it but didn't deny it either, it confused me and brought up things in me that I thought buried. The only one who didn't believe them was my friend Cynthia, who ironically was the first one to freak out about my coming out.

Sometimes people, _a posteriori_ , say stuff like "you shouldn't have come out to him/her" but in this case I had still a child's mind and really thought Cynthia was my friend because we liked the same shitty music. I couldn't guess she was going to take it badly, and it did hurt me. She got grossed out and simply walked out on me. That marked the beginning of a period of my life where I was absolutely friendless and lonely.

My next shot was me coming out to the only professor that liked me and helped me out academically. Right away he called me "Parsel" and laughed, I guess he was trying to be cool. I hated the nickname by then but I smiled to be polite. He then said I didn't "look" bisexual, lightened a cigarette and proceed to tell me it was probably a phase 'cause I was still "so young", and he seemed sad 'cause I (in his words) looked like a regular girl who could get a boyfriend whenever she felt like it. And this professor was no boomer. He was pretty young, probably only seven years older than me at the time. 

I didn’t get lucky at the campus LGBT group either, you'll be sad to know. They thought I was some sort of clown appearing there for their amusement, couldn't stop giggling and snickering the entire time I was speaking. A few on them thought I was pretending to like girls to get the boys' attention (amazing what one Katy Perry song can do to the world). Others told me to make my mind up, that I was either straight or gay. And yet others told me to leave and never talk to them again, called me homophobic out of nowhere (I only got this years later). Only one person stood by me, sweet Martin, and he’s a friend I still keep.

The next part of the process for me was trying to figure out what the hell was the reason behind Sophie's actions. 

My professor was right in that I was too young, but I still came to the ruthless and simple conclusion that some people are just like Sophie. They lie, they manipulate, and they’re not meant for love, or even sex if you're feeling fussy. And I wasn’t going to give up on life because I had run into one of those people. Had I ever been in love with Sophie? To quote Howard Wolowitz, "of course I was in love with her, I saw her naked, for crying out loud!". Speaking more seriously, maybe I did fall in love, in my naive and cringey way, but it doesn’t matter in the long run. As far as this story goes, some things are best not to be dwelled upon.

**Epilogue**

A year later, I was working at a record store in LA. And the story of how I got that job is incredible in the way life makes everything fit together. It was still 2010 and I was looking for a job in LA, just walking by a shopping center, when I found a CD on the floor. It said only “SOLA”, the letters formed by weird human figures joined together. 

“Give it back!” I heard a male voice shouting behind me.

“I didn’t steal it!” I raised my hands, dropping the CD on the ground again. Did I mention I’m a clumsy idiot?

The guy came over me, saw my face and started speaking to me in Spanish, Argentinian Spanish. I relaxed, lowering my hands down. He told me some kid had just shoplifted from his record store and that CD fell off his bag. I asked him what band was it and he said, “Mötley Crüe, of course”. I told him I heard about them in the nineties (what a terrible time to learn about the Crüe!) but hadn't listened to any of their songs. The guy, whose name was Facundo, told me all he could about them, all excited, said that I was missing out and _Saints of Los Angeles_ was a kickass record. The rest is history.

That’s also how I got to see Blaze again, in a way. Remember her? She was the Czech girl I met at Lovesick’s concert in Paris. She looked very different in 2011, with her once soft nails now painted black, dyed dark hair and tattoos all over; but I didn’t comment on it right away.

“Blaze!”

She remembered me, thank God.

“Hi, Sandra! Lovesick, right?"

"Yeah. What are you doing in the States?"

"I’m at UCLA now, I transferred,” she said, her Eastern Europe accent showing more and more.

“Ah, cool! What are you studying?”

“Computer engineering".

We sat down at this icecream store and ordered two cups apiece. It was right next to the record store.

“I didn’t think you’d remember me,” she told me. “And I look so metal nowadays!”

“You listen to metal now?”

She nodded and proudly said, “Black, death, all extreme metal.”

“Wow.”

“How about you? Still strung up on HIM and all those guys?”

“No, not all, actually. I went back to my eighties roots.”

“Eighties? Like hair metal?”

“Yeah. Poison, Guns N' Roses, Mötley Crüe… You know the drill. It was this bitch at school who made me quit them for HIM. You know, Ville. She said it wasn't cool to like hair metal."

Blaze laughed. She didn’t look at all menacing laughing, even with all the metal chick persona. “That’s a shame,” she said.

We said nothing for a moment, just glanced around. 

“So, that summer in Paris, huh?” I said. 

“Ugh, tell me about it!” Blaze said, covering her face. 

“Don’t tell me you had crazy shit happen to you too.”

Blaze sighed. “It’s a long story.”

“I’m a sucker for long stories. Try me."

“I don’t know…” Blaze glanced around. “Do they sell beers in here?”

“No!” _That’s really weird,_ I thought _. She ended up an alcohol aficionado like me?_ “Why do you want a beer, was it that bad?”

“Yes!”

A waitress came with our icecream cups and left.

“Won’t you think I’m a freak if I tell you?” Blaze told me.

“Aside from the make-up---I mean, no I won’t”, I chuckled. 

She still didn’t say anything, just ate, so it turned awkward. I was gonna go to the bathroom when she finally spoke:

“I’m _really_ not gay.”

I raised an eyebrow. “Okay….?" 

Blaze turned red and hid her face in her arms. “She made me do it." 

“She, who?”

I should had seen it from miles away, but for some reason I didn’t.

“Sophie!” Blaze exclaimed, and I went pale. I know because Blaze told me so. “Oh my God, you look like a ghost!”

“You go on..." I said.

“Well, about a month after we all met, she took me to her house too. And we kind of… did stuff.”

"Kind of? Dude, you either do it or you don't." 

Blaze was so red, it was funny.

"Fine, we did stuff. Lots of times." 

She looked hurt remembering all of it. 

“She dumped you too, huh?” I blurted out, regretting it immediately. 

“Too?"

I nodded. 

"You're gay?"

"Bi,” I said casually, waving off with a hand.

"How do you know?" Blaze asked me.

I shrugged and said, "I'm still attracted to guys after Sophie, so I guess I must be bi."

Blaze just looked at me. I've had that happen to me quite often after coming out to someone.

“Now you answer me", I smirked, "she dumped you or did you dump her?" 

Blaze’s face puckered.

“She did the dumping… freakin' bitch…"

We just ate for a while, not saying anything. The reality of it all was sinking down on us.

“So she’s…?” I said.

“Bi like you, probably,” Blaze said.

“... And she does it to all the girls she meets.”

“Most likely.”

I stared at the filled spoon. “Aren’t we lucky.”

“I don’t wanna be lucky! I don’t wanna be anything! I just want to go back to _normal_.”

“You could. I mean, if you still like guys.”

“That’s the trouble…. “ and she lowered her voice. “What if I don’t like them anymore? What if I never did?”

“I don’t know, dude. It's not the end of the world. Just relax…"

“It’s easy for you. You’re practically American. Surrounded by liberals.”

It hurt, the way she said it.

“I'm practically an immigrant, if anything”, I said. “Hear me out, I can’t even pronounce English properly.”

She said nothing.

“And there’s nothing wrong with being a lesbian anyway, if that’s what you are,” I added.

I sat there thinking, just my luck. I come out to the LGBT people campus and they think bisexuality is a joke, and now dear Blaze thinks being gay is a sin, or something.

“I’m sorry,” Blaze said. “It’s just, this is all too much for me... Are you religious?”

“Not anymore,” I said.

She seemed defeated.

“But it hasn’t been all that easy for me either….” I said, and she brightened up a little. “It got better since I started working at the store,” I pointed back at the record store with my thumb, "but I was K.O. for months".

“Oh… and you quit college?”

“Yeah, never liked marketing.”

“Huh. Your parents didn’t get upset?”

“Probably, but I didn’t see them. I left them a note and got here. To LA, I mean".

Her phone beeped. She checked it out and giggled. 

"Did you hear the news about Stevie?" she asked me. 

"What news? I’ve been disconnected from the band.”

Blaze was in hysterics as she said, "He was gay! Sophie was right!" 

"HOLY CRAP!" I covered my lips. 

"Yeah, they found him doing it with some guy in England! It was wild." 

"I bet," I said.

"Then he came out, said he had been living a lie, blah blah blah." 

"So that was the end of Lovesick," I guessed. 

"I wouldn't be so sure, half of the girls are still in love with Stevie. Can you believe it?" 

"In this world, yes."

In retrospective, I should have guessed Stevie was gay. Sometimes, rumors have their salt of truth.

The icecream store put the song "Ur so gay" on. I mean, the nerve of that. Imagine eating delicious coco icecream while some wacko tells a guy to hang himself because he's not man enough. 

"Katy Perry's something, huh?" Blaze commented. 

"Some violent fuck," I said. 

Me and Blaze ended up talking about music and things like the weather, and parted ways after exchanging e-mails. It made me sad that she thought the way she did about being LGBT, but I knew I couldn’t convince her, stubborn as she got, otherwise; that’s why I avoided crashing with her.

I went back to work and my boss asked me about Blaze. I told him most of the truth, that she was someone I met while in Paris. He knew about the messy relationship with my parents and my college problems, but that was it. Not that he was a bad guy, I just don't like oversharing.

Anyway. So we joked about black metal weirdos for a while and he told me to please arrange the vinyls on the L and M rows. I, of course, couldn't help myself and played "Same Ol Situation" from the laptop while I did it. I felt like boogieng to it. 

_She's got an alligator bag_

_Top hat to match_

_Dressed in black on black_

_She's got a Flipino girlie_

_She claims is her friend_

_I tell you boys, you just gotta laugh_

When the song was over, I looked down at my Poison tattoo: it definitely needed a re-vamping. Damn right it did, it had cost me ten bucks!

"Don't forget to turn out the lights when you're done!" my boss instructed me from the basement.

"Okay!" I shouted and searched for my keys to leave the store.

We hadn't had love metal albums arriving in months. All was well.

**THE END**

P.S.: Fuck Katy Perry.

**Author's Note:**

> This one has a [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6efftKsd57O6B7xXsMZqGn?si=dUIergSASc-ettJdvcHFnQ) too.


End file.
